this precipice, this joy
by hoidn
Summary: Michaela and Sully's wedding night.


This deviates slightly from canon. I wrote tl;dr notes at borrowedfable dot dreamwidth dot org slash 183852 dot html. The title comes from Margaret Atwood's poem "Lying here".

* * *

When the time came to change from their wedding clothes into something more suitable for travelling, Michaela felt as though only a moment had passed since she'd woken in her bed at the homestead and looked at the empty space beside her with such anticipation. With Dorothy and Rebecca's assistance, she changed from her wedding gown. As they chattered and laughed around her, she felt buoyed, as though filled with something lighter than blood, lighter than air. It was mid-afternoon by the time everyone gathered at the station to farewell them. It seemed to take hours to say goodbye and then suddenly it was just her and Sully, waving as the train pulled away.

Whether by accident or someone's design, they were the only passengers from Colorado Springs. Standing in the empty carriage, it occurred to Michaela that this was the first time they'd been alone together all day.

She turned to Sully as he shut the door behind him and walked into his arms. "I love you. Did I tell you that?"

He smiled and rested his hands on her back. "You could tell me again."

Laughter bubbled up in her throat, her joy spilling over. "I love you."

The train jerked slightly and they stumbled together. Sully grabbed her arms to steady her and as she looked up at him she saw that he, too, remembered another moment like this. A train in Boston, when he'd told her he loved her, and she'd run.

How much everything had changed.

Not letting go, Sully leaned in and kissed her, very softly, very sweetly, as if sealing in the past. "I love you," he said, and she felt the sudden sting of tears at the wealth of feeling in his voice.

He lead her to one of the seats and they sat, her head on his shoulder and his arm around her. Out the window, Colorado Springs swept by and the landscape changed, becoming less and less familiar.

Michaela felt her eyelids growing heavy as a pleasant drowsiness settled over her. She yawned.

"Tired?" Sully asked, lacing his fingers with hers.

"A little," she admitted.

"It's gonna be a couple of hours 'til we get to Denver. You should sleep if you want to."

She sat up slightly to look at him. "This is the first time we've been alone all day. I don't want to sleep through it."

"We've got two weeks of bein' alone ahead of us."

His slow, lazy smile made her bite her lip and look down, a wonderful, fluttery feeling in her stomach. "Maybe just for a little while, then."

He tucked her back against his side, pressing a kiss to her temple. She rested in his arms, listening to the train, his breathing, feeling warm and happy and loved as her eyes closed and the world fell away.

-o-

She woke just outside of Denver, blinking in confusion at the brown back of the seat in front of her. Sometime during her nap, Sully had moved her so that she was lying curled up with her feet pressing against the side of the carriage and her head in his lap. He was looking out the window and idly stroking her hair.

She shifted so that she was on her back, looking up at him, amazed at how natural it felt, being with him like this. "You should've woken me sooner."

He trailed the backs of his fingers across her cheek. "I figured you'd wake up when you were ready."

With a contented hum, she closed her eyes again, letting him caress her face and hair, lulled by his touch, seduced by nothing more than the pads of his fingers and the heat of his thigh cushioning her head. Desire began to rise within her, gradually, like tendrils of steam, barely there. It was heady, the way he could make her feel without even trying, like champagne bubbles under her skin. She felt herself sinking into the sensation, welcoming it, wanting it to go on and on.

All too soon the train whistle blew and their momentum began to slow. Immediately self-conscious and embarrassed at the idea of someone seeing her in such a state, Michaela sat up and straightened her dress, attempted to set her hair to rights.

Sully took one of her fidgeting hands and brought it to his mouth. "You look beautiful," he said against her fingers, making her stomach flutter again.

"I feel beautiful when you look at me that way," she told him unsteadily.

Again he flashed that lazy smile. "Good."

Disembarking, gathering their luggage, the journey to the hotel - it all sped by in a flurry of motion. It wasn't until the porter closed the door of their suite behind him that the delightful whirl inside Michaela came to an abrupt, lurching halt.

They had two rooms: a large sitting area and, through a doorway off to the right, the bedroom. The porter had placed their luggage there while discreetly pointing out the facilities. Michaela had barely heard a word he'd said, transfixed as she was by the bed. It seemed impossibly huge.

Now the porter had gone and Sully stood by the door, his eyes on her, something very _male_ in his gaze. Her heart seemed to be lodged somewhere in her throat. She tried to tell herself that such a thing was physiologically impossible, but all her rationality, all the courage and ease she'd felt on the train, had vanished, and she was as shy and frightened as she had ever been.

"I should change," she said in a high voice she hardly recognised as her own. Sully merely nodded and she fled to the relative privacy of the bedroom and shut the door behind her.

Sitting at the dressing table she pressed a hand to her churning stomach and closed her eyes. She took a deep breath, trying to steady herself. The resurgence of the fear she thought she'd conquered made her angry with herself. _There is nothing to be afraid of_, she told herself sternly.

But how she hated the helpless feeling of not knowing. Not knowing what was expected of her, what Sully would want. Studying medicine had made her well versed in the anatomical realities of conjugal relations. She could name all the various structures involved, could explain the precise process by which the act was accomplished, yet none of the knowledge gave her any measure of comfort. There was no text, no journal she could consult; even Dorothy's advice, well-intentioned though it was, hadn't done much to illuminate anything beyond what she already knew.

Her only guide was Sully. And perhaps that was part of the fear.

Before him, she'd never shared so much of herself, given so much of herself, to another. She had allowed him into her heart and into her mind, yet somehow the intimacy of allowing him into her body made her so much more vulnerable. It was, in a sense, the last barrier between them. There would be nothing left of herself that would be separate anymore. Perhaps that was why she'd thrown up a wall of reason around the subject, to protect herself.

Opening her eyes, Michaela examined her reflection in the mirror. Many men had called her beautiful, but only Sully had called her brave. He had been so patient with her. And would continue to be, she knew. He wouldn't press her. They could go down to the dining room and eat, perhaps take a walk. Later they would come back to the room and he might offer to read to her. But was that what she really wanted?

From the mirror, she studied the room behind her. The sunlight beyond the curtains had almost faded and the room was lit within by twin points. A lamp on each bedside table shone on the snowy bedlinen and deepened the shadows of the high canopy. The longer she looked, the less frightening the scene appeared. Only a bed, after all.

Unbidden, a memory came to her of the day she had discovered the bed Sully was carving for them as her wedding present. How flustered she had been, how aware of him physically. And then the pleasure of his body pressing hers into the floor. For a moment the recollection superimposed over the reflection of the bed and a warm, liquid sensation spread through her. She pressed her hands to her heated cheeks and met her eyes in the mirror. She loved Sully; she trusted him. She _wanted_ to be with him.

_Knowledge the wing wherewith we fly to heaven,_ she told herself, and gathered her courage.

She removed her necklace first, then her boots and stockings, her dress. No sounds came from the other room, no hint of what Sully was doing. All she could hear was the rustling of fabric and her heartbeat thudding in her ears. It seemed terribly loud in the silence.

In her underclothes, she sat again to take down her hair. One by one she removed the pins and combs holding everything in place and set them carefully on the dressing table. The tightness at her scalp eased as piece by piece the heavy mass fell down around her shoulders.

Michaela regarded herself in the mirror one last time. Her cheeks were flushed and her eyes were bright. She couldn't help but smile. It was her wedding night and her husband was on the other side of the door. For the first time since they'd arrived at the hotel, she felt excitement mingling with her nerves.

She pulled her hair to one side and over her shoulder, so that her back was exposed. Deciding she wasn't quite brave enough to walk into the other room in only her underclothes, she stood next to the bed, one hand on the bedpost to steady herself. "Sully," she called. "Will you help me, please?"

When he opened the door and stepped into the room, she couldn't quite meet his eyes. Instead, she turned so that her back was to him. "I can't manage the laces," she said, gesturing to her corset. It was only a small lie.

Sully walked up behind her soundlessly and touched her hair. "You took it down."

"Yes."

He placed a gentle kiss on the back of her neck. "I like it this way."

Gooseflesh rose along her shoulders and arms at the touch of his lips, her skin tingling.

Sully wrapped his arms about her, resting his chin on her shoulder. It seemed he'd taken off his jacket while she was undressing. The fabric of his shirt was soft against the bare skin of her arms. She placed her hands over his and marvelled at their contrast.

"Michaela, we don't have to do this right now." His voice was warm and tender against her ear. He had said they would go slowly and she knew he meant it. He would be as patient as she needed him to be.

Love swamped her and she held tight to his hands. "I want to."

For a long moment he didn't say anything or move to touch her further and she felt a lurch of embarrassment in her stomach. "Unless you don't?"

Sully exhaled sharply against her neck and his arms tightened around her. "I want to."

She shivered at his tone, at the intent.

He pressed another kiss to her shoulder and then withdrew his hands from under hers. She felt the tug of his nimble fingers working at her back. For a few moments there was only the sound of laces sliding through eyelets, then the constriction around her ribs eased as the corset fell away.

Michaela took a deep breath and tried to turn but Sully held her still, his fingers easing the sleeves of her chemise down to her upper arms. Then his mouth was moving at the nape of her neck, trailing kisses across her shoulder. She felt herself softening, pooling like wax. At the gentle scrape of his teeth, her head fell back against him, and his lips moved to the side of her throat, her ear.

"I've been thinkin' about this for a long time," he said softly as he began brushing tiny kisses across her jaw, down the line of her neck. "I think the first time... remember the night we broke Cloud Dancin' out?"

"I-" She struggled to think. "Olive's hurdy gurdy. I remember."

"You were wearin' a blue dress with a long row of buttons at the front and your hair was down." His mouth played over her skin, now skimming, now with tiny flicks of his tongue. "You looked so beautiful I wished I could dance with you just so I'd have a reason to touch you."

His hands smoothed over her arms as he spoke, long strokes down to her fingertips and back up again. "Later, after we got Cloud Dancin' away, I couldn't stop thinkin' about you. About what it would be like to be the man lucky enough to undo all those buttons, kiss every place I uncovered."

She felt she was turning into liquid, dissolving under his words, his touch. When his hand came up to brush her chin she half turned for his mouth and was kissing him, turning fully, rising up on her toes and pressing the whole length herself against him. His mouth was urgent, intoxicating. She'd lost all sense of herself, of any part of her he wasn't touching, as if she only existed where their bodies met.

His hands moved to her hips and then up, under her chemise, stroking the bare skin of her back. She arched against him, nerve endings she'd never been aware of seeming to come to life. Her spine became one long column of sensation as his fingers trailed higher, his palms cupping the ridges of her shoulder blades. Then he swept his hands down again and around her waist, thumbs swirling over the tender skin there, dipping lower to find the sensitive places over her hip bones. And all the while they were kissing, kissing, her arms tight around his neck to keep from falling. It was as though she were being set on fire from the inside.

When Sully broke away from her mouth to kiss her cheeks, her eyelids, she felt his fingers go to the buttons at the neckline of her chemise. Her eyes fluttered open as his hands took hers, and he drew her to the side of the bed. He was watching her in a way that made her heart stutter in her chest, his gaze like a living thing, a snare that caught her and wouldn't let her get away.

"When you look at me like that, I can't breathe."

He reached out and brought her back into his arms. "You're shakin'."

And she was, she discovered. Fine tremors ran through her whole body. "I'm a little nervous," she admitted.

"It's just me," he said, fingers warm against her cheek.

"I know. That's why I'm nervous."

"Why?"

It was hard, so hard to say the words. She dropped her eyes to the buttons on his shirt. "I don't want to disappoint you."

"You couldn't." His voice held so much tenderness, so much love. "Michaela, look at me." When she did, he held her face in both of his hands and kissed her long and slow. "You couldn't." He pressed his brow against hers and let his hands rest on her shoulders. "Any time you want to stop you just say so."

She nodded.

His thumbs swept up under her chin to tilt her head back as he bent and gently kissed the pulse beating in her throat. "Relax," he murmured against her skin.

She tried, she did, but she was dizzy with a desire that was nothing like the sweet contentment she'd felt on the train. Even as her pulse raced thick and hot, her body felt as though it wasn't her own, had transformed into a creature beyond her control. Sully was kissing her again, his tongue stroking, teasing, blotting out all thought so that she hardly recognised it when he drew her chemise down her arms, over her hips, and let it fall at her feet. It wasn't until his mouth left hers and began pressing kisses against her sternum that the reality of it struck her: his hair tickling her bare skin.

She opened her eyes to find herself standing between his legs as he sat on the edge of the bed. Never breaking their gaze, his fingers feathered up over her ribs with soft, glancing touches, a whisper of skin against skin. His eyes had gone dark, darker than she'd ever seen them, the blue almost swallowed by the black of his pupils.

He touched her, over and over, her ribs, her stomach, her back. He sucked lightly at the delicate skin over her clavicles, licked the valley between her breasts. The pads of his fingers were calloused in places, causing tiny frictions that sent sparks racing across her flesh. Her breath came in shallow pants. Somehow her hands had risen to grip his shoulders, kneading the muscles there. Her breasts had grown heavy, her nipples hard peaks. All she could think was that she wanted, needed him to touch her there.

Then he stood again and his body seemed so large suddenly, so solid and real. Her head fell forward against his chest and all the while he was touching her everywhere, everywhere except where she wanted him to. Her skin felt too tight, almost painfully sensitised, as if she would burst and fly apart.

"Do you like this?" he said against her ear and she couldn't speak, could only turn her face into his neck and nod.

He shifted and one hand came up to brush the hair from her cheek. Easing back, he kissed her mouth and lifted her in one fluid motion so that for a moment she thought the spinning sensation was in her head. Then she felt cool sheets under her heated skin and opened her eyes as Sully stripped the shirt over his head. She felt a clutch in her belly at the sight of him, the broad expanse of sleek muscle, the animal grace. His skin was hot when he lay next to her as if he, too, was burning up, his palm on her belly pressing heat to heat.

"Look at you." He said it with a kind of reverence and she tried to smile, but his hand was inching higher and everything in her was attuned to that slow, torturous movement.

A soft brush under the curve of her breast, then one finger traced the slope, circling the nipple but never quite touching it. Finally, finally, he took her breast in his whole hand, cupping it, cradling it, and she arched up, unable to stop herself. His thumb began to move over her nipple and it was so good she could hardly bear it, the hot, liquid tug of pleasure in her belly, lower. She pushed her face into his shoulder, trying to breathe his skin, trying to stifle the sounds that rose up to clog her throat.

Then his hand moved to the other breast and he bent his head. The wet heat of his mouth surrounded her and she cried out, clutching at him. He flicked her with his tongue, sucked her into his mouth, nipped at her delicately with his teeth, on and on until she was panting, whimpering, moving restlessly against the unbearable throbbing between her legs.

"Sully, please-" It was a sob, but she couldn't finish, didn't know exactly what it was that she was asking.

Raising his head, he stroked her face. "I know," he whispered, "I know." He took one of her hands from where it gripped his shoulder and brought it to his lips, kissed her fingers, her palm. Then he bent to her mouth again and she kissed him hungrily, greedily, with a kind of eager desperation. Her hands mapped the plains of his shoulders and back, everywhere smooth, hot skin and shifting muscle. Desire was a weight on her chest, squeezing her lungs so that she almost suffocated on it, and all she wanted was more.

He knelt by her and hooked his fingers in the waist of her drawers, drew them slowly down her legs so that the slide of the fabric was like a caress. She should've felt exposed, had thought she'd feel exposed when the time came, but when he eased her knee up and began placing kisses on her ankle, all she felt was a dazed, trembling delight. The sensation was so disconcerting, so provocative. How absurd it seemed that she could name all the muscles and bones of the lower limbs but she'd never felt a man's warm hands along her calves. It was as though everything she knew about anatomy suddenly had no meaning.

Her breath hitched as he moved higher, placing wet, open-mouthed kisses against the inside of her knee, her thigh. She watched him watching her in a way that was so familiar yet so different. And she had a moment to wonder, when he rose up over her, that he was still wearing his trousers.

Then he touched her.

Her body stiffened. His fingers moved slowly, gently between her legs at first, then more firmly, more sure. It was like being burned alive, without flame, without injury. Like lightning coursing through her, so hot and bright she couldn't possibly contain it. High, desperate sounds came from her throat and her hips were moving against his hand of their own accord as though they knew, they had always known, they had just been waiting for this moment.

She felt his finger enter her so gently and her body spasmed as though it were trying to hold him there within her. He moaned as it happened and her heart raced even faster. There was nothing, nothing but him. He watched her avidly. All she could see was his face, the wild blue of his eyes a thin ring around the black. All she could feel were his hands, urging her, taking her over. It was more than pleasure, too intense, too ferocious, like being consumed. It was too much, too overwhelming, she couldn't stand it. She shook her head against the pillow as a new tension overtook her.

"No," she whimpered, struggling against something she didn't understand. "Oh, God."

"It's all right," he said hoarsely, his breathing as harsh as her own. "Just let it happen. I've got you. I've got you."

Her hands gripped at him, at the sheets, anything to anchor herself against the terrible onslaught, as her body tightened, quaking, as that hot, bright light inside her coalesced, as it flamed through her whole body, the savage turmoil of a summer storm, melting and shattering her at once.

-o-

When she came back to herself, Sully was stroking her hip. He smiled sweetly as she opened her eyes. Everything had been a blur of sensation since he first touched her, but now as she caught her breath, as she stretched her heavy limbs, she could see the tension in him, the cost of his restraint. It had grown fully dark outside and they were lit only by lamplight. The strong planes of his face looked sculpted, taut, the skin stretched tight over the bones. For the first time she felt the quiver in his muscles, the hard ridge of his arousal at her hip. New excitement rose in her as though from a bottomless well. She wanted him to feel what she had felt. She wanted to be the reason he felt it.

It was easier now, she discovered, as though something long held fast within her had been loosened. She rose up slightly to kiss him - _her husband_, she thought, with another wash of pleasure - and turned herself just a little towards him. He held himself on one elbow, the muscles of his arm and shoulder hard under her fingertips as she worked them up into his hair. With both hands she pulled him down to her until her breasts pressed against his chest. They were still sensitive from his earlier caresses so that the touch of his skin lanced through her, an arrow of heat. Instinctively, she turned more fully into him, pulled him closer. When her bent knee rode up, over his thigh, his hips bucked against her once - shockingly arousing - before he wrenched away.

He was panting, the sound harsh in the silence, as he pressed his face into the curve of her neck. She held him close, wanting what was to come but unsure how to say it or even if she should.

After a long moment he lifted his head to look at her. "You sure?" he asked seriously. His fingers shook a little where they lay on her belly and she was humbled that he could still, even now, be patient.

She smiled and touched his lips. "Yes."

He kissed the tips of her fingers and then rose to stand and undress completely, unselfconscious under her gaze. In the dim light his skin seemed to glow. It was true that she had seen naked men before, but never at full arousal. Never her husband. Looking at him, everything inside her seemed to pulse in tandem, all her fear and shyness gone. In that moment, she understood that this was what she had wanted all along, perhaps even from the first time he'd kissed her. What she had been frightened of was not his desire but her own.

He knelt on the bed, crawled slowly up her body, dropping kisses as he ascended, graceful and intent as a hunting animal.

"You're so beautiful," she whispered, love and want tangling inside her.

His mouth moved over her breasts, her throat. He shifted onto his elbows, settling between her thighs, and she felt the blind seeking of his body for hers. She knew the strength of the muscles under her fingertips, the weight of him pressing her into the ground, yet nothing had prepared her for this. Nothing in her textbooks, none of the scientific Latin terms, could match the raw, human language of their bodies.

The pain was unlike anything she had ever felt, an enormous pressure, as if she were being split in two. A sound of distress escaped her and Sully stopped moving, held himself very still. "I'm sorry," he murmured as he kissed her gently. "I'm sorry."

She struggled to breathe, to reassure him. "I'm all right."

He reached back and lifted her knee, pushing her leg toward her chest. It felt strange and undignified and yet the pain receded a little. She pulled her other leg into the same position and felt the pain lessen even more.

"Better?"

"Yes," she said with some surprise. Her knees were flush against his ribs in what seemed an odd sort of embrace. She shifted experimentally.

Sully's head dropped to her shoulder and he let out a sound very much like a growl.

"I'm sorry."

"Don't be," he muttered, which made her laugh. Her inner muscles contracted in a way that was unexpectedly pleasurable. "Michaela-" this time his voice was choked "-stop that."

She bit her lip and tried to lie very still. As he rose up on his elbows again to look down at her, she could _feel_ the way his body moved within hers. "You're part of me now," she said in wonder, her fingers roving over his cheeks, his nose, his lips. "I love you so much."

He kissed her then, and it was as if he was kissing her with his whole self, with nothing held back. He began to move within her, against her, over her, and nothing could have prepared her for the sheer animal physicality of it. She turned her head to kiss the bunched muscle of his arm, the skin there warm and salty. She threaded her fingers through his hair and watched the intensity of his face, the strain of holding himself back, and knew he was trying not to hurt her more. But she had brought him into her body as she had her heart; it was a choice she had made with clarity, with joy. Her love for Sully was sometimes ferocious, sometimes frightening, sometimes painful. How could their physical union be any less?

"It's all right," she told him, looking into his eyes. "I've got you."

As he moved faster, deeper, fragments of a Cheyenne story he'd once told her came back to her. Man and woman separated into two beings from one, trying to find that wholeness together again. She watched it overtake him, the pleasure, the need, and understood as she never had before that the intimacy came not solely from the act itself but from the trust he gave her in that moment when his mouth slackened and his eyes glazed. When he opened himself to her as she had opened to him. When he gave himself up to what they made together.

It was one of the most astonishing, most profound experiences of her life.

-o-

Later, when she lay cradled and sheltered by his body, when his hands drifted idly over her back and through her hair, she wondered if it had been the same for him.

"I had no idea it would be like this," she said softly into the quietness of the room.

"Like what?"

"So..." She searched for a word adequate to express what she felt. "Powerful."

He lifted her hand from where it lay against his chest and kissed it tenderly. "With you and me it couldn't be anythin' else."

For the second time that day, tears stung her eyes. She wondered if she would ever become accustomed to the way he understood her.

Raising herself up a little, she placed a kiss over his heart. "Do you know what an extraordinary man you are?"

Sully only regarded her with his usual steady gaze. "I love you," he said. "That's not so extraordinary."

But it was, she thought. It was the most extraordinary thing of all.

* * *

"Knowledge the wing wherewith we fly to heaven" - from Henry VI, Part 2. C'mon, you know Michaela's memorised some Shakespeare.


End file.
